


Pancakes, With a Side Order of Surprise

by prairiecrow



Series: Terra Incognita Version 2.0 [1]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Knight Rider (1982), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Adopted Children, Androids, Breakfast, Clint Barton Has His Own Fan Club, Clint is Surprised, Established Relationship, Gen, Life in Avengers Tower, My Little Pony is Mentioned, Sleepovers, Tony Stark Is Actually Pretty Good At Being a Daddy, future!fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-13
Updated: 2014-01-13
Packaged: 2018-01-08 15:18:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,363
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1134200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prairiecrow/pseuds/prairiecrow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clint Barton had seen his share of strange things while living in Stark Tower, including the time he'd entered the Avengers common room to find Thor's brother Loki lounging on the couch eating a Cheez Whiz sandwich and watching CNN — but truly, you'd have to go a long way to top the experience of walking into the Avengers shared kitchen early one Sunday morning to find Kitt Silver, decked out in a pink frilly apron over his usual crisp white dress shirt and black chinos, making breakfast for five very sleepy-looking little girls in pajamas, robes, and slippers of various degrees of fluffiness…</p><p>(OR, Madeleine Stark is very proud of both her Papa and her Daddy.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pancakes, With a Side Order of Surprise

**Author's Note:**

> A tale in the "Terra Incognita Version 2.0" Alternate Universe, which diverges from the main series shortly after Tony and KITT's wedding. The main series can be found here:
> 
> http://archiveofourown.org/series/33456

Barton had seen his share of strange things while living in Stark Tower, including the time he'd entered the Avengers common room to find Thor's brother Loki lounging on the couch eating a Cheez Whiz sandwich and watching CNN — but truly, you'd have to go a long way to top the experience of walking into the Avengers shared kitchen early one Sunday morning to find Kitt Silver, decked out in a pink frilly apron over his usual crisp white dress shirt and black chinos, making breakfast for five very sleepy-looking little girls in pajamas, robes, and slippers of various degrees of fluffiness. Those five sets of droopy eyelids shot wide open when Clint came walking in with his recurved bow slung on his back, looking for a cup of coffee before heading down to practice on the range, and he'd be lying if he'd later tried to claim he didn't stop dead in his tracks in the doorway, staring back like a deer caught in the headlights. 

"Ah, Clint! Good morning!" Kitt said pleasantly, using a ladle to dip batter out of a big bowl and drop it in neat circles on the wide griddle. "Could I interest you in a stack of chocolate chip pancakes?" 

"With strawberries and whipped cream!" Madeleine Stark chimed in helpfully from the centre island, giving her long mouse-blonde hair a little shake to flip it out of her eyes. Her four friends were still staring at Clint like they weren't sure whether or not he was about to whip out the bow and engage in a little target practice, using them as handy targets.  

S.H.I.E.L.D. agents did not say "Um…" when caught flat-footed. Therefore, Clint definitely did no such thing. He couldn't smell any coffee, but the kitchen was redolent with the cloying sweet scent of hot chocolate, obviously coming from the mugs each girl had resting on the tabletop in front of them or clutched in their hands. "No thanks, I just…" He gestured at the coffee maker.  

" _Your usual blend, Agent Barton?_ " JARVIS inquired from the ceiling, as the coffee machine started to whir efficiently.

"That's perfect. Thanks."  

" _Of course. Your coffee will be ready in forty-one seconds._ " 

Clint managed to eat up a good six seconds of that time in sauntering slowly toward the coffee maker, and another two and a half seconds leaning down to rest his right elbow on the counter with elaborate casualness. Then he loosely interlaced his fingers, aware of those five juvenile female gazes burning into his profile like S.H.A.D.O.W. lasers, and fixed his attention on the softly gurgling machine — which would, if there was indeed a God (or at least a sympathetic JARVIS), have its hot libation ready for him well before the forty-one second mark so he could beat a strategic retreat.

"Wow," the red-haired girl finally breathed, and Clint didn't have to look up to know that hero-worship was filling her slate-blue eyes with shining stars and throbbing hearts, "are you _Hawkeye_?" 

Four different responses to that question automatically presented themselves, but Clint elected to go with the polite one: after all, Tony was very touchy about how people treated his adopted daughter, and that sensitivity might extend to said daughter's friends. "Yes. I am." 

The girl with short black hair perked right up.  "My sister Elsie thinks you're the coolest Avenger _ever_." She giggled into her cupped right hand. "I think she wants to marry you when she grows up!" Which set off a storm of more giggles around the table and made Madeleine roll her eyes — she'd known "Uncle Clint" too long to be anything but blasé about his charms.  

"That's because he _is_ the coolest Avenger ever," Kitt noted as he started to flip the little pancakes under his care with a deft spatula. 

"Pa- _pa_ ," Madeleine admonished him, pronouncing it as she always did, with a French inflection, "you and Daddy are the coolest Avengers ever! D'uh!"

"If you say so," Kitt smiled, "and come to think of it I'm pretty sure your Daddy would agree!"

Out of the corner of his eye, Clint could see that the attention of the pack had now turned to the android at the griddle. "Are you _really_ Obsidian?" the one with braided golden hair asked. 

Kitt gave the rest of the batter a quick stir. "Sometimes, yes." 

Which prompted a sceptical scowl. "So you're not — real?" 

"I'm perfectly real," KITT responded instantly. "I'm just not human." He transferred the finished pancakes to a plate and brought the plate to the table, smiling at Little Miss Braids as he set it down in the middle of the circle of plates ready to receive the fruits of his labours. "That's a pretty big claim, isn't it? Here, let me show you something…" 

Clint had seen Kitt do this before, for especially skeptical adults: roll up his left sleeve above the elbow, touch a certain point on his inner forearm, and split the synth skin and muscle open from elbow joint all the way up to the tip of his middle finger, revealing the gold titanium alloy submuscular sheath, the flat repulsor disk in his palm, and the delicately articulated finger joints. Four shrill squeals pierced the kitchen's air, ranging in quality from _Ewww, gross!_ to _Oh wow, that's amazing!_  

The most delighted by far was Black Hair. "You're a _robot!_ " 

"An android, actually," KITT corrected. "Which is a specific kind of robot." 

"That's _brutal!_ " The pancakes sat forlorn, momentarily completely forgotten, as she leaned in closer, reaching out with her right hand, then hesitated, glancing up at him.  

Kitt nodded his permission. "Go ahead. You can't hurt me."

Fascinated, she touched the sheath with a careful fingertip, then the repulsor disk, then one of the finger joints. The others seemed content to watch her explorations. "That is _so cool,_ " she said in breathless awe.  

"Thank you." His tone turned brisk. "But if you want more pancakes, it's time to stop poking the cook and let him get back to work!" He withdrew his arm, zipped up the synth skin with another press of his fingertip, then turned back toward the griddle as if he hadn't just rocked the world of four very wide-eyed little girls. "Clint, are you sure I can't interest you in a plateful? There's enough batter here to feed Thor three times over." 

Clint was just opening his mouth to decline when a rumpled, unshaven and distinctly scruffy Tony Stark wandered in through the archway, working his shoulders under his oil-smeared tank top as if he'd picked up some kinks in his muscles during what had obviously been an all-night building session. His grimace brightened to a grin as soon as he saw Kitt in his frilly apron, and he immediately headed in that direction. "Hey there, Beautiful." He pressed a relatively chaste kiss to Kitt's cheek, then crossed to the island and ruffled Madeleine's hair. "Morning, sweetheart." 

"Morning, Daddy!" She hugged him happily around the waist, heedless of his grimy condition.

"Wow," Tony said, looping an arm around her shoulders while glancing around at the gaggle of eight-year-olds, "this is one sleepy-looking batch of little girls. Don't tell me you guys were up all night working on a new repulsor capacitor too?" 

"Someone," Kitt said pointedly, "insisted on having a _My Little Pony: The Crystal Kingdom_ marathon. I'm not naming any names —" 

" _Pa_ pa," Madeleine pleaded, still grinning.

Tony laughed. "Okay, okay, I'm sorry I asked." He gave Madeleine a final fond squeeze before letting her go and reaching for one of the unclaimed stools. "Hope you made enough pancakes for six — I'm starving!" 

"Make that seven," Clint interjected while he poured his coffee, because now that he was over the initial shock of stumbling into the middle of a pre-teen slumber party — really, who was he to turn down chocolate chip pancakes freely offered, with whipped cream _and_ strawberries? 

The worshipful glow in the little red-haired girl's eyes when she moved over to make room for him at the island made missing half an hour of target practice eminently worthwhile.

THE END


End file.
